HV 885 
.B7 F23 
1832 
Copy 1 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

ii mum nun 111 



027 293 658 4 # 



HV 885 
•B7 F23 
1832 
Copy 1 



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REPORT 



ON A 



FARM SCHOOL 



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REPORT 



ESTABLISHMENT 



FARM SCHOOL. 



A meeting of gentlemen to take into consideration 
a plan for the more extensive education and rescue 
of the idle and morally exposed children of this city, 
of which the Hon. Charles Jackson was Chair- 
man, and Charles C. Paine, Esq. Secretary, was 
holden in the Hall of the Tremont Bank, on Friday 
afternoon, January 27th, 1832. After discussion of 
the subject proposed to them, the following resolution 
was adopted, on motion of the Rev. Dr. Tuckerman, 
as the opinion of the meeting : — 

" Resolved, That the establishment of a Farm 
School, in the country, where the idle and morally 



exposed children of the city may be rescued from 
vice and danger, and may enjoy the advantages of a 
good physical and moral education, would be not 
only a great benefit to such children, but would 
greatly conduce to the peace and good order of this 
community." 

The subscribers were then appointed as a Commit- 
tee to take the whole subject into consideration ; to 
prepare a Report, and print and circulate it ; and 
then, in such way as they might judge most expe- 
dient, to call a meeting of those disposed to aid in 
the establishment of such a School. 

Under the instructions thus given, the subscribers 
would respectfully 

REPORT. 

That they have directed their attention and in- 
quiries principally to two points : First, the class of 
boys who may need such a School and discipline as 
those proposed, and are now without them ; and, 
second, the nature of the Farm School itself, with 
the principles on which it should be established, in 
order to rescue these children from their present 
dangers and prepare them to earn their subsistence 
by honest labor. 

As to the first point, — the existence of such a class 
of boys, — the Committee needed no proof beyond 



3 

their own personal knowledge. Indeed, all who have 
considered the state of the poor among us are aware, 
that there is a considerable body of children in this 
city between the ages of seven and fourteen, who are 
growing up in idleness and hastening to crime ; and 
for whose rescue no adequate or appropriate means 
are yet provided. These children are generally 
recognized and easily detected as truants from 
our public schools, and are such as we meet con- 
stantly in our streets and on our wharves, where they 
pass a large part of their time in stubborn vagrancy. 
Some of them are orphans, in whom little interest is 
felt by the poor and miserable connexions, on whom 
they hang as a heavy burthen. Some are the chil- 
dren of widows, whose time is so filled with labor to 
procure a mere subsistence, that their sons still more 
than their daughters are unavoidably neglected, and 
at seven, or even six years old, become unmanage- 
able. Some, having lost their mothers, are left to the 
care of fathers, whose means and opportunities for 
domestic control are yet less effectual than those of 
widows. Some have intemperate or profligate pa- 
rents, and suffer, of course, from the disorder and 
misery to which they were born. And some are 
children of the ignorant, inefficient and helpless, who 
seem, almost from nature, incapable of fulfilling dis- 
creetly the commonest duties of life. But all of 
them, from these and other causes, are daily and 
hourly exposed to the contagion of vice, and growing 



up in idle and ruinous habits, from which, perhaps a 
few may, by fortunate circumstances, be reclaimed 
before they arrive at manhood, while by far the 
greater part will be hurried to an early death, the 
victims of intemperance and want, or live on only to 
prey upon the community, fill our Alms-houses and 
Prisons, and increase the burthens and crimes of the 
State. 

But, for this whole class, there are now no means 
of safety and restoration provided. For while, on 
the one hand, the Boy ? s Asylum rarely receives any 
so old, and never any tainted with the faults which 
are already beginning to be developed in this un- 
happy class ; — on the other hand, the House of 
Reformation for Juvenile Offenders is closed against 
them, since none are received there, who have not 
been convicted of some offence before a Court of 
Justice. So that, singular as it may seem, it is 
nevertheless true, that the very class most needing 
protection, assistance, and discipline, and who will 
best reward them ; — the class, we mean, of the quite 
young, who in poverty and neglect are just beginning 
to yield to the temptations of guilt, — is precisely the 
class for which no provision is made among us, either 
by the institutions of the Commonwealth and the 
city, or by those of private benevolence. 

For this class of children, then, who are gro wing- 
up to become the natural enemies and great burthen 



of the community, it is proposed to provide the asy- 
lum their peculiar situation needs, and to prepare 
them, while there, for lives of industry and useful- 
ness. That the expense of such an asylum would 
ultimately prove a great economy, none can doubt ; 
since it would take an evil yet small and eradicate it, 
instead of waiting till it has grown formidable and 
perhaps unmanageable, and then attempt to alleviate, 
without hoping to cure it, by the costly apparatus of 
Alms-houses, Houses of Correction, and Prisons, 
w T hich already press with such an unwelcome and 
portentous weight on the resources of society. The 
plan for doing this, which is suggested in the preced- 
ing resolution and was more fully developed in the 
discussion, by which it was originally accompanied, is 
very simple, and, as the committee think, in all re- 
spects, well suited to its purpose. It is proposed to 
form the school of such boys between the ages of seven 
and fourteen as their parents or legal guardians may 
surrender during the remainder of their minority, or 
the directors of the school may think fit to receive ; — 
those who are younger than seven, being thought to 
require a more personal and tender care than could 
well be given in such an institution, besides being in- 
competent to the labor it requires ; while those who 
are older than fourteen, might bring with them habits 
and opinions injurious to their associates, and de- 
manding a more rigorous discipline than it would be 
desirable to introduce. — It is proposed to remove 



these boys from the city, and, therefore, from all their 
usual temptations, haunts and companions; and to 
place them on a Farm, where some of the more com- 
mon mechanic trades may be practised ; so that the 
labors, in which they will be daily instructed and en- 
gaged, either in gardening, agriculture or the useful 
arts will contribute to their health and support, and 
tend, at the same time, to form in them habits of in- 
dustry and order, and prepare them to earn their 
own livelihood. It is proposed to fill up the time not 
needed for manual labor, rest and recreation, with in- 
struction in the elementary knowledge usually commu- 
nicated in our common schools, so as to fit them for 
the occupations, to which they will probably be after- 
wards called. And finally, when they shall be found 
to have gone through the discipline and education in- 
tended by this school, it is proposed to bind out at an 
age not younger than fourteen, those who may have 
been surrendered to the directors ; generally indent- 
ing them to farmers, but sometimes to mechanics 
and others, under whom they may be qualified to 
enter with advantage on the labors of life as honest 
and useful men. 

It is proposed, that the whole establishment, as far 
as its external government, the making of rules and 
orders for its management, and the appointment of its 
master and his assistants, are concerned, should be 
placed under a Board of Directors to be annually 



chosen by the shareholders ; and that it should be 
situated so near the town as to enable the Directors 
easily to oversee it, and yet so far off as to discourage 
the visits of the connexions and former associates of 
its pupils. As far as its internal management and dis- 
cipline are concerned, it is proposed to place it under 
a head master and such assistants as experience may 
show to be needful, who shall supply, as far as possi- 
ble, that parental and domestic control, which the 
children committed to their care may before have 
failed to receive ; and who shall endeavor to form 
and cultivate in them those religious and moral prin- 
ciples, and those habits of industry, order, and fidelity 
to duty, which shall fit them to become good and 
useful men and citizens. 

It is believed, that such a school, while it would be 
a great benefit to the children educated in it, and to 
the community from which they would be taken, 
would, out of the labor of its own pupils, furnish a 
large part of the means for its own support. It is 
believed, that we can thus take those unfortunate 
children of our city, who are without the protection 
of efficient and faithful parents, and give them the 
best substitute for it ; — that we can take those who 
are growing up in ignorance and all its evils, and give 
them instruction; — and, finally, that we can take 
those, who are now in the midst of temptation and 
vice, and destined, soon to spread mischief around 



8 

them ; and prepare them for the duties and labors 
to which they will be called as men and as Chris- 
tians. And if this can be done, — as we believe it 
can, — not only will the children themselves receive 
a great benefit, but we shall directly promote the 
chief ends of society, by the prevention of evil, misery 
and crime, and by increasing the security of life and 
property. 

CHARLES JACKSON, Chairman, 

WILLIAM PRESCOTT, GEORGE BOND, 

J. TUCKERMAN, GEORGE TICKNOR, 

P. T. JACKSON, JAMES BOWDOIN, 

JOHN TAPPAN, W. C. WOODBRIDGE, 

S. T. ARMSTRONG, E. M. P. WELLS. 
MOSES GRANT, 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

027 293 658 4 



